Neil Young-On the Beach (DVD-Audio) (1974) (NTSC)

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General		Extras
Category	Music	Lyrics Gallery-Photo Discography Web Links Credits Easter Egg-EP covers from around the world
Rating	?
Year Of Production	1974
Running Time	39:34
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	None Given
Studio Distributor	Warner Vision	Starring	None Given
Case	?
RPI	?	Music	Neil Young

Video (NTSC)		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Linear PCM 48/16 2.0 (1536Kb/s) English MLP 176.4/24 2.0
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	480i (NTSC)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.78:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	None	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Born in Canada in 1945, Neil Young has been at the forefront of rock over the years. His early start was in Toronto with bands like The Squires and The Mynah Birds, which lead to him signing up with Buffalo Springfield in 1966. This joining with Buffalo Springfield also led to Neil meeting Stephen Stills, a singer and songwriter that he would work with many times over the years.

    Along with the recordings with Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Neil's solo catalogue would be one of the most diverse and critically acclaimed bodies of work in rock music. From the lauded 1972 album Harvest to his collaboration with Pearl Jam (Mirror Ball) in 1995, Neil has always done his own thing, and it's up to us to go along for the ride if we wish. Strangely, of all the Neil Young albums that were not re-released in recent years, On the Beach is perhaps one of his most memorable. There were 4 albums that hadn't seen the light of day (and hadn't seen a release in ANY digital form) since their initial release: On the Beach, American Stars 'n' Bars, Hawks & Doves and Re-ac-tor. Recorded in 1974, On the Beach embodies the raw and 'real' sound that music has for the most part long since abandoned.

    For me, this album is like a time machine. It takes the listener back to a different era where you think that things were quite a bit different from now, but in fact weren't all that different after all. This is a good album that should be right up there on the 'to get' list of any Neil Young fan.

    For those who need a bit more in-depth information on this album and the artist, here is a great link that might help:  

• http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/record-reviews/y/young_neil/on-the-american-hawks-reactor.shtml

Video

    This disc features NTSC video, but it's nice to see that what we do have is 16x9 enhanced. This includes black and white images that accompany each track on the disc. There is a little bit of colour here and there, and it looks okay, but this is limited to the album cover based menus. Each track gets its own black and white image, which is static. In fact, every image on this disc is static. There is no moving video anywhere on this disc.

Audio

    There are 2 audio options on this disc, these being an English Linear PCM 48kHz/16bit 2.0 track running at 1536Kb/s (for normal DVD player playback) and a high resolution MLP 176.4kHz/24bit 2.0 track. I listened to the 176.4kHz/24bit track through several times whilst I sampled the PCM track on a few tracks.

    I found the audio mix here to be quite good, in a sort of nostalgic fashion. This isn't the benchmark for pure audio, but it is a quite good transfer of the original 2 track material. The DVD credits specify that the sound engineers did their best to keep to keep the transfer as clean and pure as possible so as to accurately convey the original sound. I believe that they did a good job.

    There is a good deal of channel separation here, with various instruments coming from different sides of the soundstage, whilst the vocals are clearly located front centre.

    The overall fidelity of the recording shows its age. You can tell by listening that this was recorded in a particular time or era. This is in contrast to something like the Eagles Hotel California DVD-Audio disc which has the sound of having been recorded yesterday. This is not to say that the sound of this album is a bad thing. Indeed, I think that the limitations of the original equipment add an auditory element to the sound that is in some ways appealing. Just don't expect super crystal clear perfect transparent audio. There is a bit of distortion here, but it sounds intentional.

    Being a 2.0 mix, there isn't any surround information here, nor is there any dedicated LFE channel. This doesn't seem to be a problem with the material, as 2.0 is the format in which it was intended to be heard. Full sized main speakers of good quality will be able to convey the sound of this disc well.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

• Play Disc
• Songs (which brings up a selectable list of the disc's 8 tracks)
• Extras
• Easter Egg

    Upon selecting the Extras icon, you are presented with the following selections:

• Lyrics (single page of lyrics for each song)
• Photos (7 black and white photos of Neil Young on stage)
• Discography (a listing of all Neil Young's solo, band and collaboration albums, 113 pages)
• Weblink (www.neilyoung.com)
• Credits (for original album and DVD-Audio disc, 3 pages)

    If you highlight the beach chair next to Neil Young on the Main Menu, you are treated to some overseas cover art for three Neil Young albums, including the Mexican version of On The Beach (En La Playa), an EP from Taiwan and the German 7" single for Walk On.

    The video is adequate (not all that important, really)

    The audio is good if you take into consideration the age of the material and the equipment used to record it.

    There are a couple of extras, but nothing over the top.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall